Robert Duvall

Robert Selden Duvall is an American actor and director. He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA

British Academy Film Awards

The British Academy Film Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . It is the British counterpart of the Oscars. As of 2008, it has taken place in the Royal Opera House, having taken over from the flagship Odeon cinema on Leicester Square...

A character actor is one who predominantly plays unusual or eccentric characters. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a character actor as "an actor who specializes in character parts", defining character part in turn as "an acting role displaying pronounced or unusual characteristics or...

, Duvall has starred in some of the most acclaimed and popular films and TV shows of all time, among them The Twilight Zone

The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series)

The Twilight Zone is an American anthology television series created by Rod Serling, which ran for five seasons on CBS from 1959 to 1964. The series consisted of unrelated episodes depicting paranormal, futuristic, dystopian, or simply disturbing events; each show typically featured a surprising...

To Kill a Mockingbird is a 1962 American drama film adaptation of Harper Lee's novel of the same name directed by Robert Mulligan. It stars Mary Badham in the role of Scout and Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch....

The Godfather is a 1972 American epic crime film directed by Francis Ford Coppola, based on the 1969 novel by Mario Puzo. With a screenplay by Puzo, Coppola and an uncredited Robert Towne, the film stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard...

The Godfather Part II is a 1974 American gangster film directed by Francis Ford Coppola from a script co-written with Mario Puzo. The film is both a sequel and a prequel to The Godfather, chronicling the story of the Corleone family following the events of the first film while also depicting the...

MASH is a 1970 American satirical dark comedy film directed by Robert Altman and written by Ring Lardner, Jr., based on Richard Hooker's novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors. It is the only feature film in the M*A*S*H franchise...

Network is a 1976 American satirical film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer about a fictional television network, Union Broadcasting System , and its struggle with poor ratings. The film was written by Paddy Chayefsky and directed by Sidney Lumet...

Bullitt is a 1968 American police procedural film starring Steve McQueen, Jacqueline Bisset and Robert Vaughn. It was directed by Peter Yates and distributed by Warner Bros. The story was adapted for the screen by Alan Trustman and Harry Kleiner, based on the 1963 novel Mute Witness by Robert L....

Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American war film set during the Vietnam War, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The central character is US Army special operations officer Captain Benjamin L. Willard , of MACV-SOG, an assassin sent to kill the renegade and presumed insane Special Forces...

Tender Mercies is a 1983 American drama film directed by Bruce Beresford. The screenplay by Horton Foote focuses on Mac Sledge, a recovering alcoholic country music singer who seeks to turn his life around through his relationship with a young widow and her son in rural Texas...

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

as a handsome young lead actor during the late 1950s, moving into television

Television

Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

roles during the early 1960s in such works as To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) (as Boo Radley) and Captain Newman, M.D.

Captain Newman, M.D.

Captain Newman, M.D. is a 1963 film starring Gregory Peck, Tony Curtis, Angie Dickinson, Robert Duvall, Eddie Albert and Bobby Darin. It was directed by David Miller and filmed on location at Fort Huachuca, Arizona....

(1963). He started to land much larger roles during the early 1970s with films like the blockbuster comedy MASH (1970) (as Major Burns) and the lead in George Lucas

George Lucas

George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...

THX 1138 is a 1971 science fiction film directed by George Lucas in his directorial debut. The film is based on a screenplay by Lucas and Walter Murch...

(1971). This was followed by a series of critically lauded performances in films which were also commercial successes: The Godfather (1972), The Godfather Part II (1974), Network (1976), The Great Santini

The Great Santini

The Great Santini is a 1979 film which tells the story of a Marine officer whose success as a military aviator contrasts with his shortcomings as a husband and father. The film explores the high price of heroism and self-sacrifice...

True Confessions is a 1981 film directed by Ulu Grosbard, loosely based on the Black Dahlia murder case of 1947. The film stars Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall, was produced by Chartoff-Winkler Productions and is adapted from the novel of the same name by John Gregory Dunne.-Plot summary:In the...

(1981).

Since then Duvall has continued to act in both film and television with such productions as Tender Mercies (1983) (for which he won an Academy Award), The Natural (1984), Colors

Colors (film)

Colors is a 1988 police procedural crime film starring Sean Penn and Robert Duvall and directed by Dennis Hopper. The story takes place in South Central Los Angeles, and is about Bob Hodges , an experienced LAPD Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums Police Officer III, and his rookie partner,...

Stalin is a 1992 television film, produced for HBO, starring Robert Duvall portraying Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. The film won three Golden Globe Awards among various awards including cinematography awards for Vilmos Zsigmond...

The Man Who Captured Eichmann is a 1996 movie about the capture of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann by the Israeli secret service Mossad.The film ends with the take-off of the El Al aircraft taking Eichmann to face trial in Jerusalem. In real life, this aircraft was a turboprop-powered Bristol...

The Apostle is a 1997 American drama film written and directed by Robert Duvall, who stars in the title role. John Beasley, Farrah Fawcett, Billy Bob Thornton, June Carter Cash, Miranda Richardson and Billy Joe Shaver also appear...

Gods and Generals is a 2003 American film based on the novel Gods and Generals by Jeffrey Shaara. It depicts events that take place prior to those shown in the 1993 film Gettysburg, which was based on The Killer Angels, a novel by Shaara's father, Michael...

Broken Trail is a 2006 Western miniseries that originally aired on American Movie Classics as their first original movie. It stars Robert Duvall and Thomas Haden Church, and was directed by Walter Hill....

Early life

San Diego is the eighth-largest city in the United States and second-largest city in California. The city is located on the coast of the Pacific Ocean in Southern California, immediately adjacent to the Mexican border. The birthplace of California, San Diego is known for its mild year-round...

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

admiral. Duvall's father was a Methodist of distant French Huguenot descent, while his mother was a Christian Scientist of German

German American

German Americans are citizens of the United States of German ancestry and comprise about 51 million people, or 17% of the U.S. population, the country's largest self-reported ancestral group...

Christian Science is a system of thought and practice derived from the writings of Mary Baker Eddy and the Bible. It is practiced by members of The First Church of Christ, Scientist as well as some others who are nonmembers. Its central texts are the Bible and the Christian Science textbook,...

religion and has stated that while it is his belief, he does not attend church. Duvall grew up in the traditional life of a career military family, moving frequently from military base to military base, living for a time in Annapolis

Annapolis, Maryland

Annapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Maryland, as well as the county seat of Anne Arundel County. It had a population of 38,394 at the 2010 census and is situated on the Chesapeake Bay at the mouth of the Severn River, south of Baltimore and about east of Washington, D.C. Annapolis is...

Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

Severn School was founded in 1914 by Rolland M. Teel in Severna Park, Maryland, as a preparatory school for the United States Naval Academy. Today, Severn is a day school enrolling boys and girls in grades 6 through 12...

Severna Park is a census-designated place in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States. The population was 28,507 at the 2000 census.-History:Robinson House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2009.-Geography:...

Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

The Principia is an educational institution for Christian Scientists located on two campuses in the St. Louis, Missouri area. Principia School, located in West St. Louis County, serves students from early childhood through high school...

Principia College is a four-year private co-educational liberal arts college in Elsah, Illinois. The campus sits on bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River between Alton and Grafton, located about thirty miles north of St. Louis. In 1934, Principia College graduated its first class as a full...

The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

Private First Class is a military rank held by junior enlisted persons.- Singapore :The rank of Private First Class in the Singapore Armed Forces lies between the ranks of Private and Lance-Corporal . It is usually held by conscript soldiers midway through their national service term...

. While stationed at Camp Gordon (now known as Fort Gordon) in Georgia

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...

Room Service is an RKO film comedy starring the Marx Brothers and based on the 1937 play of the same name by Allen Boretz and John Murray. It co-stars Lucille Ball, Ann Miller, Alexander Asro, and Frank Albertson.-Plot outline:...

Augusta is a consolidated city in the U.S. state of Georgia, located along the Savannah River. As of the 2010 census, the Augusta–Richmond County population was 195,844 not counting the unconsolidated cities of Hephzibah and Blythe.Augusta is the principal city of the Augusta-Richmond County...

Acting is the work of an actor or actress, which is a person in theatre, television, film, or any other storytelling medium who tells the story by portraying a character and, usually, speaking or singing the written text or play....

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

Sanford Meisner , also known as Sandy, was an American actor and acting teacher who developed a form of Method acting that is now known as the Meisner technique....

. While working to become an actor, he worked as a Manhattan post office

Post office

A post office is a facility forming part of a postal system for the posting, receipt, sorting, handling, transmission or delivery of mail.Post offices offer mail-related services such as post office boxes, postage and packaging supplies...

Eugene Allen "Gene" Hackman is an American actor and novelist.Nominated for five Academy Awards, winning two, Hackman has also won three Golden Globes and two BAFTAs in a career that spanned five decades. He first came to fame in 1967 with his performance as Buck Barrow in Bonnie and Clyde...

whom he knew during their years as struggling actors. At one point, Duvall roomed with Hoffman while they were looking for work.

Early career: 1956–1969

Duvall began his career in the theatre, performing in the summer theatre company, Gateway Playhouse

Gateway Playhouse

Gateway Playhouse is a summer theatre located on the eastern edge of Bellport, Long Island. The street address is 215 South Country Road. It's the oldest of three professional theatres on the island and nationally recognized as one of the top ten summer theatres in the nation. Gateway Playhouse...

, in Bellport, Long Island where he played the role of Virgil Blessing in BUS STOP. He was known as Bob Duval at that time. He made his professional debut Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway

Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...

The Gate Theatre was an Off-Broadway theatre in New York City that was active during the 1950s through 1970s. Located at 162 Second Avenue in the East Village, the theatre the was founded in 1957 by Lily Turner. It closed in the early 1970s.-External links:...

George Bernard Shaw was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60...

Mrs Warren's Profession is a play written by George Bernard Shaw in 1893. The story centers on the relationship between Mrs Kitty Warren, a brothel owner, described by the author as "on the whole, a genial and fairly presentable old blackguard of a woman" and her daughter, Vivie...

on June 25, 1958. Other notable early theatre credits include the role of Doug in the premiere of Michael Shurtleff

Michael Shurtleff

Michael Shurtleff was a major force in casting on Broadway during the 1960s and 1970s. He wrote Audition, a book for actors on the audition process...

Call Me By My Rightful Name is an American play by Michael Shurtleff which is based on a story by S.F. Pfoutz. The production premiered Off-Broadway on January 31, 1961 at the One Sheridan Square theatre where it ran for a total of 127 performances...

William Hartwell Snyder, Jr. was an American playwright and a longtime faculty member of the theatre department at the University of Tennessee at Martin. He is best known for his play The Days and Nights of BeeBee Fenstermaker.-Biography:Snyder attended Yale University's School of Drama where he...

The Days and Nights of BeeBee Fenstermaker is an American play by William Snyder. The work premiered Off-Broadway at the Sheridan Square Playhouse on September 17, 1962, closing on June 9, 1963 after 304 performances. The production was directed by Ulu Grosbard and used set and lighting designs by...

Arthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...

A View from the Bridge is a play by American playwright Arthur Miller that was first staged on September 29, 1955 as a one-act verse drama with A Memory of Two Mondays at the Coronet Theatre on Broadway. The play was unsuccessful and Miller subsequently revised the play to contain two acts; this...

The Sheridan Square Playhouse was an Off-Broadway theatre in New York City that was active from 1958 through the early 1990s. Closed as a theatre in 1996, the theatre was located at 99 7th Avenue South in Greenwich Village.-History:...

Ulu Grosbard is a Belgian-born, naturalized American theatre and film director and film producer.Born in Antwerp, Grosbard emigrated to Havana with his family in 1942. In 1948, they moved to the United States, where he earned Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees from the University of Chicago...

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

Wait Until Dark is a play by Frederick Knott.-Synopsis:Susy Hendrix is a blind Greenwich Village housewife who becomes the target of three con-men searching for the heroin hidden in a doll, which her husband Sam innocently transported from Canada as a favor to a woman who has since been murdered...

Armstrong Circle Theatre is an American anthology drama television series which ran from 1950 to 1957 on NBC, and then until 1963 on CBS. It alternated weekly with The U.S. Steel Hour.-Synopsis:...

in the episode The Jailbreak. He appeared regularly on television as a guest actor during the 1960s, often in action, suspense, detective, or crime dramas. His appearances during this time include performances on Alfred Hitchcock Presents

Alfred Hitchcock Presents

Alfred Hitchcock Presents is an American television anthology series hosted by Alfred Hitchcock. The series featured dramas, thrillers, and mysteries. By the premiere of the show on October 2, 1955, Hitchcock had been directing films for over three decades...

Naked City is a police drama series which aired from 1958 to 1963 on the ABC television network. It was inspired by the 1948 motion picture of the same name, and mimics its dramatic "semi-documentary" format....

The Untouchables is an American crime drama that ran from 1959 to 1963 on ABC. Based on the memoir of the same name by Eliot Ness and Oscar Fraley, it fictionalized the experiences of Eliot Ness, a real-life Prohibition agent, as he fought crime in Chicago during the 1930s with the help of a...

Route 66 is an American TV series in which two young men traveled across America. The show ran weekly on CBS from 1960 to 1964. It starred Martin Milner as Tod Stiles and, for two and a half seasons, George Maharis as Buz Murdock. Maharis was ill for much of the third season, during which time Tod...

The Twilight Zone is an American television anthology series created by Rod Serling. Each episode is a mixture of self-contained drama, psychological thriller, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, or horror, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist...

The Outer Limits is an American television series that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1965. The series is similar in style to the earlier The Twilight Zone, but with a greater emphasis on science fiction, rather than fantasy stories...

The Fugitive is an American drama series produced by QM Productions and United Artists Television that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1967. David Janssen stars as Richard Kimble, a doctor from the fictional town of Stafford, Indiana, who is falsely convicted of his wife's murder and given the death...

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea is an American science fiction film, produced and directed by Irwin Allen, released by 20th Century Fox in 1961. The story was written by Irwin Allen and Charles Bennett. Walter Pidgeon starred as Admiral Harriman Nelson, with Robert Sterling as Captain Lee Crane...

The Time Tunnel is a 1966–1967 U.S. color science fiction TV series. The show was created and produced by Irwin Allen, his third science fiction television series. The show's main theme was Time Travel Adventure. The Time Tunnel was released by 20th Century Fox and broadcast on ABC. The show ran...

To Kill a Mockingbird is a 1962 American drama film adaptation of Harper Lee's novel of the same name directed by Robert Mulligan. It stars Mary Badham in the role of Scout and Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch....

Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

Albert Horton Foote, Jr. was an American playwright and screenwriter, perhaps best known for his Academy Award-winning screenplays for the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird and the 1983 film Tender Mercies, and his notable live television dramas during the Golden Age of Television...

, who met Duvall at Neighborhood Playhouse during a 1957 production of Foote's play, The Midnight Caller

The Midnight Caller (play)

The Midnight Caller is a play by American playwright Horton Foote. The work was first performed in 1957 as part of a student production at the Neighborhood Playhouse with a cast including Robert Duvall. It had its professional premiere Off-Broadway at the Sheridan Square Playhouse where it opened...

. Foote, who would collaborate with Duvall many more times over the course of their careers, said he believed Duvall had a particular love of common people and ability to infuse fascinating revelations into his roles. Foote has described Duvall as "our number one actor."

After To Kill a Mockingbird, Duvall appeared in a number of films during the 1960s, mostly in mid sized parts but also in a few larger supporting roles. Some of his more notable appearances include the role of Capt. Paul Cabot Winston in Captain Newman, M.D.

Captain Newman, M.D.

Captain Newman, M.D. is a 1963 film starring Gregory Peck, Tony Curtis, Angie Dickinson, Robert Duvall, Eddie Albert and Bobby Darin. It was directed by David Miller and filmed on location at Fort Huachuca, Arizona....

The Rain People is a 1969 film by Francis Ford Coppola. Alongside Shirley Knight, leading players are James Caan and Robert Duvall, both of whom would later work with Coppola in The Godfather. Future film director and Coppola friend George Lucas worked as an aide on this film, and made a short...

. Duvall has a small part as a cab driver who ferries McQueen around just before the chase scene in the film Bullitt (1969). He was the notorious malefactor "Lucky" Ned Pepper in True Grit (1969), in which he engaged in a climactic shootout with John Wayne

John Wayne

Marion Mitchell Morrison , better known by his stage name John Wayne, was an American film actor, director and producer. He epitomized rugged masculinity and became an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive calm voice, walk, and height...

's Rooster Cogburn on horseback.

Mid career: 1970–1989

Duvall became an important presence in American films beginning in the 1970s. He drew a considerable amount of attention in 1970 for his portrayal of Major Frank Burns in the film MASH

MASH (film)

MASH is a 1970 American satirical dark comedy film directed by Robert Altman and written by Ring Lardner, Jr., based on Richard Hooker's novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors. It is the only feature film in the M*A*S*H franchise...

THX 1138 is a 1971 science fiction film directed by George Lucas in his directorial debut. The film is based on a screenplay by Lucas and Walter Murch...

in 1971. His first major critical success came portraying consigliere (family counsel) Tom Hagen

Tom Hagen

Thomas "Tom" Feargal Hagen is a fictional character in the Godfather books and films. He was portrayed by Robert Duvall in the films. He is the informally adopted son of Don Vito Corleone and serves as the family lawyer and consigliere . Mild-mannered and soft-spoken, he often serves as a voice of...

The Godfather is a 1972 American epic crime film directed by Francis Ford Coppola, based on the 1969 novel by Mario Puzo. With a screenplay by Puzo, Coppola and an uncredited Robert Towne, the film stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Robert Duvall, Sterling Hayden, John Marley, Richard...

The Godfather Part II is a 1974 American gangster film directed by Francis Ford Coppola from a script co-written with Mario Puzo. The film is both a sequel and a prequel to The Godfather, chronicling the story of the Corleone family following the events of the first film while also depicting the...

(1974). The former film earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. In 1976 Duvall played supporting roles in The Eagle Has Landed

The Eagle Has Landed

The Eagle Has Landed is a book by Jack Higgins set during World War II. It first published in 1975. It was made into a film of the same name in 1976 starring Michael Caine...

The Seven-Per-Cent Solution is a 1976 Universal Studios Sherlock Holmes film, directed by Herbert Ross and written by Nicholas Meyer. It is based on Meyer's 1974 novel of the same name. The film stars Nicol Williamson, Robert Duvall, Alan Arkin, and Laurence Olivier.-Plot synopsis:When Dr...

Alan Wolf Arkin is an American actor, director, musician and singer. He is known for starring in such films as Wait Until Dark, The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Catch-22, The In-Laws, Edward Scissorhands, Glengarry Glen Ross, Marley & Me, and...

Vanessa Redgrave, CBE is an English actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a political activist.She rose to prominence in 1961 playing Rosalind in As You Like It with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has since made more than 35 appearances on London's West End and Broadway, winning...

Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the...

Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American war film set during the Vietnam War, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The central character is US Army special operations officer Captain Benjamin L. Willard , of MACV-SOG, an assassin sent to kill the renegade and presumed insane Special Forces...

(1979). His line "I love the smell of napalm in the morning" from Apocalypse Now is now regarded as iconic

Cultural icon

A cultural icon can be a symbol, logo, picture, name, face, person, building or other image that is readily recognized and generally represents an object or concept with great cultural significance to a wide cultural group...

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

history. The full text is as follows:
Duvall received a BAFTA Award nomination for his portrayal of television executive Frank Hackett in the critically acclaimed film Network

Network (film)

Network is a 1976 American satirical film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer about a fictional television network, Union Broadcasting System , and its struggle with poor ratings. The film was written by Paddy Chayefsky and directed by Sidney Lumet...

Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...

The Great Santini is a 1979 film which tells the story of a Marine officer whose success as a military aviator contrasts with his shortcomings as a husband and father. The film explores the high price of heroism and self-sacrifice...

The United States Marine Corps is a branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for providing power projection from the sea, using the mobility of the United States Navy to deliver combined-arms task forces rapidly. It is one of seven uniformed services of the United States...

and overbearing parent LtCol. "Bull" Meechum. The latter role was loosely based on a Marine aviator, Colonel Donald Conroy

Donald Conroy

Donald "The Great Santini" Conroy was a United States Marine Corps colonel and a member of the famed Black Sheep Squadron during the Korean War. He was also a veteran of World War II and of two tours of duty in Vietnam. He is best known as the being the inspiration for the character LtCol...

Pat Conroy , is a New York Times bestselling author who has written several acclaimed novels and memoirs. Two of his novels, The Prince of Tides and The Great Santini, were made into Oscar-nominated films.-Early life:...

A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...

Ike is a 1979 television miniseries about the life of Dwight D. Eisenhower. The screenplay by Melville Shavelson was based on Kay Summersby's 1948 memoir Eisenhower Was My Boss and her 1975 autobiography, Past Forgetting: My Love Affair. Directed by Boris Sagal and Melville Shavelson, the...

(1979).

In 1977 Duvall returned to Broadway to appear as Walter Cole in David Mamet

David Mamet

David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director.Best known as a playwright, Mamet won a Pulitzer Prize and received a Tony nomination for Glengarry Glen Ross . He also received a Tony nomination for Speed-the-Plow . As a screenwriter, he received Oscar...

American Buffalo is a 1975 play by American playwright David Mamet which had its premiere in a showcase production at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago. After two more showcase productions, it opened on Broadway on February 16, 1977...

The Drama Desk Awards, which are given annually in a number of categories, are the only major New York theater honors for which productions on Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway compete against each other in the same category...

The Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play was first awarded at the 1974–1975 Drama Desk Awards and has been awarded every year since. Before the 21st Drama Desk Awards, acting awards were given without making distinctions between roles in straight dramas as opposed to musicals, nor were...

. To date, Duvall has not returned to the New York stage.
Duvall continued to appear in important films during the 1980s, including the roles of cynical sportswriter Max Mercy in The Natural

The Natural (film)

The Natural is a 1984 film adaptation of Bernard Malamud's 1952 baseball novel of the same name, directed by Barry Levinson and starring Robert Redford, Glenn Close and Robert Duvall...

Colors is a 1988 police procedural crime film starring Sean Penn and Robert Duvall and directed by Dennis Hopper. The story takes place in South Central Los Angeles, and is about Bob Hodges , an experienced LAPD Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums Police Officer III, and his rookie partner,...

Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...

Tender Mercies is a 1983 American drama film directed by Bruce Beresford. The screenplay by Horton Foote focuses on Mac Sledge, a recovering alcoholic country music singer who seeks to turn his life around through his relationship with a young widow and her son in rural Texas...

(1983). Foote was rumored to have written the part for Duvall, who had always wanted to play a country singer and contributed ideas for the character. Foote denied this, claiming he found it too constraining to write roles for specific actors, but he did hope Duvall would be cast. Duvall was said to have written the music, but the actor said he wrote only a few "background, secondary songs." Duvall did do his own singing, insisting it be added to his contract that he sing the songs himself; Duvall said, "What's the point if you're not going to do your own (singing)? They're just going to dub somebody else? I mean, there's no point to that."

Tess Harper is an American actress.-Early life:Born Tessie Jean Washam on August 15, 1950 in Mammoth Spring, Arkansas. Her parents' names are Ed and Rosemary Washam. She grew up around lots of quilts and quilt makers. On her own time, she liked to sit on the porch-swing and read...

, who co-starred, said Duvall inhabited the character so fully that she only got to know Mac Sledge and not Duvall himself. Director Bruce Beresford

Bruce Beresford

Bruce Beresford is an Australian film director who has made more than 30 feature films over a 40-year career.-Early life:...

, too, said the transformation was so believable to him that he could feel his skin crawling up the back of his neck the first day of filming with Duvall. Beresford said of the actor, "Duvall has the ability to completely inhabit the person he's acting. He totally and utterly becomes that person to a degree which is uncanny." Nevertheless, Duvall and Beresford did not get along well during the production and often clashed during filming, including one day in which Beresford walked off the set in frustration.

Lonesome Dove is a 1985 Pulitzer Prize–winning western novel written by Larry McMurtry. It is the first published book of the Lonesome Dove series, but the third installment in the series chronologically...

in the role of Augustus "Gus" McCrae. He has stated in several forums, including CBS Sunday Morning, that this particular role was his personal favorite. He won a Golden Globe Award and earned an Emmy Award

Emmy Award

An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...

nomination. For his role as a former Texas Ranger peace officer, Duvall was trained in the use of Walker revolvers by the Texas marksman

Marksman

A marksman is a person who is skilled in precision, or a sharpshooter shooting, using projectile weapons, such as with a rifle but most commonly with a sniper rifle, to shoot at long range targets...

Joe Bowman, born Joseph Lee Bowman , was a Houston bootmaker and marksman called "The Straight Shooter", considered to have been a guardian of Texas and western frontier culture. Shortly after his death, Bowman was inducted posthumously into the Texas Heroes Hall of Honor at the Frontier Times...

.

Later career: 1990–present

Duvall has maintained a busy film career, sometimes appearing in as many as four in one year. He received Oscar nominations for his portrayals of evangelical preacher Euliss "Sonny" Dewey in The Apostle

The Apostle

The Apostle is a 1997 American drama film written and directed by Robert Duvall, who stars in the title role. John Beasley, Farrah Fawcett, Billy Bob Thornton, June Carter Cash, Miranda Richardson and Billy Joe Shaver also appear...

(1997) — a film he also wrote and directed — and lawyer Jerome Facher in A Civil Action

A Civil Action

A Civil Action is a 1998 American drama film starring John Travolta and Robert Duvall, based on the book of the same name by Jonathan Harr...

Assassination Tango is a 2002 crime film written, produced, directed by, and starring Robert Duvall. It is a thriller about an assassin's discovery of Argentine tango. Other actors include Rubén Blades, Kathy Baker and Duvall's wife, Luciana Pedraza. Francis Ford Coppola was one of the executive...

Gods and Generals is a 2003 American film based on the novel Gods and Generals by Jeffrey Shaara. It depicts events that take place prior to those shown in the 1993 film Gettysburg, which was based on The Killer Angels, a novel by Shaara's father, Michael...

The Confederate States Army was the army of the Confederate States of America while the Confederacy existed during the American Civil War. On February 8, 1861, delegates from the seven Deep South states which had already declared their secession from the United States of America adopted the...

general.

Other roles during this period that displayed the actor's wide range included that of a crew chief in Days of Thunder

Days of Thunder

Days of Thunder is a 1990 American auto racing film released by Paramount Pictures, produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer and directed by Tony Scott. The cast includes Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Robert Duvall, Randy Quaid, Cary Elwes and Michael Rooker. The film also features appearances...

The Paper is a 1994 American comedy-drama film directed by Ron Howard and starring Michael Keaton, Robert Duvall, and Glenn Close. The film depicts 24 hours in a newspaper editor's professional and personal life.-Plot:...

Phenomenon is a 1996 romantic fantasy-drama film written by Gerald Di Pego, directed by Jon Turteltaub, and starring John Travolta, Kyra Sedgwick, Forest Whitaker, and Robert Duvall....

(1996), an abusive father in 1996's Slingblade, an astronaut in Deep Impact

Deep Impact (film)

Deep Impact is a 1998 science-fiction disaster-drama film released by Paramount Pictures and DreamWorks in the United States on May 8, 1998. The film was directed by Mimi Leder and stars Robert Duvall, Elijah Wood, Téa Leoni, and Morgan Freeman...

Open Range is a 2003 American Western film co-starring, co-produced, and directed by Kevin Costner, based on the novel The Open Range Men by Lauran Paine. Starring alongside Costner are Robert Duvall, Annette Bening, and Michael Gambon....

(2003), a soccer coach in the comedy Kicking & Screaming, an old free spirit in Secondhand Lions

Secondhand Lions

Secondhand Lions is a 2003 American dramedy film written and directed by Tim McCanlies. It tells the story of an introverted young boy who is sent to live with his eccentric uncles on a farm in the U.S...

We Own the Night is a 2007 American crime drama film written and directed by James Gray and starring Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg, Eva Mendes and Robert Duvall. It is the third film directed by Gray, and the second film to feature Phoenix and Wahlberg together, the first being The Yards...

The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...

on September 18, 2003.

Duvall has periodically worked in television during the last two decades. He won a Golden Globe and garnered an Emmy nomination for his portrayal of Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

A leader is one who influences or leads others.Leader may also refer to:- Newspapers :* Leading article, a piece of writing intended to promote an opinion, also called an editorial* The Leader , published 1909–1967...

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

Stalin is a 1992 television film, produced for HBO, starring Robert Duvall portraying Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. The film won three Golden Globe Awards among various awards including cinematography awards for Vilmos Zsigmond...

. He was nominated for an Emmy again in 1997 for portraying Adolf Eichmann

Adolf Eichmann

Adolf Otto Eichmann was a German Nazi and SS-Obersturmbannführer and one of the major organizers of the Holocaust...

The Man Who Captured Eichmann is a 1996 movie about the capture of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann by the Israeli secret service Mossad.The film ends with the take-off of the El Al aircraft taking Eichmann to face trial in Jerusalem. In real life, this aircraft was a turboprop-powered Bristol...

A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...

Broken Trail is a 2006 Western miniseries that originally aired on American Movie Classics as their first original movie. It stars Robert Duvall and Thomas Haden Church, and was directed by Walter Hill....

The National Medal of Arts is an award and title created by the United States Congress in 1984, for the purpose of honoring artists and patrons of the arts. It is the highest honor conferred to an individual artist on behalf of the people. Honorees are selected by the National Endowment for the...

George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...

.

Duvall founded a production company, Butcher's Run Films, but it appears to have ceased operation.

Marriages

Duvall has been married four times: First to Barbara Benjamin from 1964 until 1975. He then married Gail Youngs (1982–1986; temporarily becoming the brother-in-law of John Savage

John Savage (actor)

John Savage is an American film actor, producer, production manager, and composer.- Acting career :...

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

. They were both born on January 5, but Duvall is 41 years older. They have been together since 1997. He produced, directed, and they acted together in Assassination Tango, with the majority of filming in Buenos Aires.

Duvall and Pedraza have been active supporters of Pro Mujer, a non-profit charity organization dedicated to helping Latin America's poorest women (with Duvall and Pedraza concentrating on Pedraza's home of northern Argentina) help themselves through micro-credit, business training and health care links.

He has fathered no children, although he says he has made a number of attempts to do so.

Politics

Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....

The United States presidential election of 2008 was the 56th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on November 4, 2008. Democrat Barack Obama, then the junior United States Senator from Illinois, defeated Republican John McCain, the senior U.S. Senator from Arizona. Obama received 365...

Sarah Louise Palin is an American politician, commentator and author. As the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party and first Republican woman nominated for the vice-presidency.She was...

New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...

.

Charity work

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. , branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal-Mart before then, is an American public multinational corporation that runs chains of large discount department stores and warehouse stores. The company is the world's 18th largest public corporation, according to the Forbes Global 2000...

The Battle of the Wilderness, fought May 5–7, 1864, was the first battle of Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's 1864 Virginia Overland Campaign against Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia. Both armies suffered heavy casualties, a harbinger of a bloody war of attrition by...

national park in Orange County, Virginia.

In 2011, Duvall appeared at a record-breaking Houston charity event when he was interviewed by Bob Schieffer

Bob Schieffer

Bob Lloyd Schieffer is an American television journalist who has been with CBS News since 1969, serving 23 years as anchor on the Saturday edition of CBS Evening News from 1973 to 1996; chief Washington correspondent since 1982, moderator of the Sunday public affairs show Face the Nation since...

Texas Children's Cancer and Hematology Centers is the largest pediatric oncology and blood disease center in the United States. U.S. News & World Report ranked the cancer center #1 in Texas and #4 in the United States. It is located in Houston, Texas....

William Wilson became a figure in the folklore of southeastern and south-central Pennsylvania in the late 18th century and early 19th century. He is often referred to as The Pennsylvania Hermit. His sister Elizabeth had been condemned for the murder of her children, although many believed her to...

Route 66 is an American TV series in which two young men traveled across America. The show ran weekly on CBS from 1960 to 1964. It starred Martin Milner as Tod Stiles and, for two and a half seasons, George Maharis as Buz Murdock. Maharis was ill for much of the third season, during which time Tod...

Naked City is a police drama series which aired from 1958 to 1963 on the ABC television network. It was inspired by the 1948 motion picture of the same name, and mimics its dramatic "semi-documentary" format....

To Kill a Mockingbird is a 1962 American drama film adaptation of Harper Lee's novel of the same name directed by Robert Mulligan. It stars Mary Badham in the role of Scout and Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch....

"Miniature" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.-Synopsis:Charley Parkes thinks he sees a figure in a museum dollhouse that comes alive.Charley returns to the museum numerous times and gazes into the dollhouse...

Stoney Burke is a short-lived Western television series broadcast on the ABC television network from October 1, 1962 until May 20, 1963. The series starred Jack Lord, who would later go on to star in the popular television series, Hawaii Five-O....

Arrest and Trial is a 90-minute American Police procedural/legal drama that ran during the 1963-64 season on ABC, airing Sundays from 8:30-10 p.m. Eastern.The majority of episodes consisted of two segments...

Captain Newman, M.D. is a 1963 film starring Gregory Peck, Tony Curtis, Angie Dickinson, Robert Duvall, Eddie Albert and Bobby Darin. It was directed by David Miller and filmed on location at Fort Huachuca, Arizona....

Kraft Suspense Theatre, an anthology series, was telecast from 1963 to 1965 on NBC. Sponsored by Kraft Foods, it was seen three weeks out of every four and was pre-empted for Perry Como's Kraft Music Hall specials once monthly...

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea is a 1960s American science fiction television series based on the 1961 film of the same name. Both were created by Irwin Allen, which enabled the movie's sets, costumes, props, special effects models, and sometimes footage, to be used in the production of the...

Combat, or fighting, is a purposeful violent conflict meant to establish dominance over the opposition, or to terminate the opposition forever, or drive the opposition away from a location where it is not wanted or needed....

Shane is an American Western television series based on the 1949 book of the same name by Jack Schaefer . The series was created by Herschel Daugherty and Gary Nelson, and starred David Carradine as the title character...

Fame Is the Name of the Game is an American TV-movie, directed by Stuart Rosenberg, that aired on NBC and served as the pilot episode of the subsequent series The Name of the Game. The film stars Tony Franciosa as an investigative journalist and presents the screen debut of 20-year-old Susan...

Cimarron Strip is an American Western television series that aired on CBS from September 1967 to March 1968. Starring Stuart Whitman as Marshal Jim Crown, the series was produced by the creators of Gunsmoke...

Run for Your Life is an American television drama series starring Ben Gazzara as a man with only a short time to live. It ran on NBC from 1965 to 1968. The series was created by Roy Huggins, who had previously explored the "man on the move" concept with The Fugitive.-Synopsis:Gazzara plays lawyer...

Bullitt is a 1968 American police procedural film starring Steve McQueen, Jacqueline Bisset and Robert Vaughn. It was directed by Peter Yates and distributed by Warner Bros. The story was adapted for the screen by Alan Trustman and Harry Kleiner, based on the 1963 novel Mute Witness by Robert L....

MASH is a 1970 American satirical dark comedy film directed by Robert Altman and written by Ring Lardner, Jr., based on Richard Hooker's novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors. It is the only feature film in the M*A*S*H franchise...

Thomas "Tom" Feargal Hagen is a fictional character in the Godfather books and films. He was portrayed by Robert Duvall in the films. He is the informally adopted son of Don Vito Corleone and serves as the family lawyer and consigliere . Mild-mannered and soft-spoken, he often serves as a voice of...

Lady Ice is a 1973 crime film about an insurance investigator who becomes involved with a wealthy young woman he suspects of fencing stolen jewelry. The film was directed by Tom Gries, and stars Donald Sutherland, Jennifer O'Neill, and Robert Duvall....

Network is a 1976 American satirical film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer about a fictional television network, Union Broadcasting System , and its struggle with poor ratings. The film was written by Paddy Chayefsky and directed by Sidney Lumet...

Best Actor in a Supporting Role is a British Academy Film award presented annually by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding supporting performance in a film...

Invasion of the Body Snatchers is a 1978 science fiction film based on the novel The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney. It is a remake of the 1956 film of the same name. It was directed by Philip Kaufman and starred Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams and Leonard Nimoy.A San Francisco health inspector and...

Ike is a 1979 television miniseries about the life of Dwight D. Eisenhower. The screenplay by Melville Shavelson was based on Kay Summersby's 1948 memoir Eisenhower Was My Boss and her 1975 autobiography, Past Forgetting: My Love Affair. Directed by Boris Sagal and Melville Shavelson, the...

Apocalypse Now is a 1979 American war film set during the Vietnam War, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The central character is US Army special operations officer Captain Benjamin L. Willard , of MACV-SOG, an assassin sent to kill the renegade and presumed insane Special Forces...

True Confessions is a 1981 film directed by Ulu Grosbard, loosely based on the Black Dahlia murder case of 1947. The film stars Robert De Niro and Robert Duvall, was produced by Chartoff-Winkler Productions and is adapted from the novel of the same name by John Gregory Dunne.-Plot summary:In the...

The Venice International Film Festival is the oldest international film festival in the world. Founded by Count Giuseppe Volpi in 1932 as the "Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica", the festival has since taken place every year in late August or early September on the island of the...

Tender Mercies is a 1983 American drama film directed by Bruce Beresford. The screenplay by Horton Foote focuses on Mac Sledge, a recovering alcoholic country music singer who seeks to turn his life around through his relationship with a young widow and her son in rural Texas...

The Venice International Film Festival is the oldest international film festival in the world. Founded by Count Giuseppe Volpi in 1932 as the "Esposizione Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica", the festival has since taken place every year in late August or early September on the island of the...

Colors is a 1988 police procedural crime film starring Sean Penn and Robert Duvall and directed by Dennis Hopper. The story takes place in South Central Los Angeles, and is about Bob Hodges , an experienced LAPD Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums Police Officer III, and his rookie partner,...

1988

Officer Bob Hodges

Feature film

Lonesome Dove

1989

Augustus "Gus" McCrae

TV mini-series

Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Miniseries or Television FilmNominated—Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor – Miniseries or a Movie

Days of Thunder is a 1990 American auto racing film released by Paramount Pictures, produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer and directed by Tony Scott. The cast includes Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Robert Duvall, Randy Quaid, Cary Elwes and Michael Rooker. The film also features appearances...

Stalin is a 1992 television film, produced for HBO, starring Robert Duvall portraying Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. The film won three Golden Globe Awards among various awards including cinematography awards for Vilmos Zsigmond...

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

Newsies is a 1992 Disney musical film starring Christian Bale, David Moscow, and Bill Pullman. Robert Duvall and Ann-Margret also appeared in supporting roles. The movie is widely claimed to have gained a cult following after its initial failure at the box office...

Joseph Pulitzer April 10, 1847 – October 29, 1911), born Politzer József, was a Hungarian-American newspaper publisher of the St. Louis Post Dispatch and the New York World. Pulitzer introduced the techniques of "new journalism" to the newspapers he acquired in the 1880s and became a leading...

Geronimo: An American Legend is a 1993 film, starring Wes Studi as Geronimo, Jason Patric as 1st Lt. Charles B. Gatewood, Gene Hackman as Brig. Gen. George Crook, Robert Duvall as Chief of Scouts Al Sieber, and Matt Damon as 2nd Lt. Britton Davis. The film was directed by Walter Hill from a...

Something to Talk About is a 1995 American romantic comedy-drama film directed by Lasse Hallström, from a screenplay written by Callie Khouri. It stars Julia Roberts and Dennis Quaid as an estranged couple, Kyra Sedgwick as Roberts's sister, and Robert Duvall and Gena Rowlands as their parents. The...

Sling Blade is a 1996 American drama film set in rural Arkansas, written and directed by Billy Bob Thornton, who also stars in the lead role. It tells the story of a mentally impaired man named Karl Childers who is released from a psychiatric hospital, where he has lived since killing his mother...

1996

Karl's father

Feature film

Nominated—Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture

Deep Impact is a 1998 science-fiction disaster-drama film released by Paramount Pictures and DreamWorks in the United States on May 8, 1998. The film was directed by Mimi Leder and stars Robert Duvall, Elijah Wood, Téa Leoni, and Morgan Freeman...

Saturday Night Live is a live American late-night television sketch comedy and variety show developed by Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. The show premiered on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title of NBC's Saturday Night.The show's sketches often parody contemporary American culture...

Troyal Garth Brooks , best known as Garth Brooks, is an American country music artist who helped make country music a worldwide phenomenon. His eponymous first album was released in 1989 and peaked at number 2 in the US country album chart while climbing to number 13 on the Billboard 200 album chart...

John Q is a 2002 film directed by Nick Cassavetes starring Denzel Washington as John Quincy Archibald, a father and husband whose son is diagnosed with an enlarged heart and then finds out he cannot receive a transplant because HMO insurance will not cover it...

Assassination Tango is a 2002 crime film written, produced, directed by, and starring Robert Duvall. It is a thriller about an assassin's discovery of Argentine tango. Other actors include Rubén Blades, Kathy Baker and Duvall's wife, Luciana Pedraza. Francis Ford Coppola was one of the executive...

Gods and Generals is a 2003 American film based on the novel Gods and Generals by Jeffrey Shaara. It depicts events that take place prior to those shown in the 1993 film Gettysburg, which was based on The Killer Angels, a novel by Shaara's father, Michael...

Secondhand Lions is a 2003 American dramedy film written and directed by Tim McCanlies. It tells the story of an introverted young boy who is sent to live with his eccentric uncles on a farm in the U.S...

Open Range is a 2003 American Western film co-starring, co-produced, and directed by Kevin Costner, based on the novel The Open Range Men by Lauran Paine. Starring alongside Costner are Robert Duvall, Annette Bening, and Michael Gambon....

American Experience is a television program airing on the Public Broadcasting Service Public television stations in the United States. The program airs documentaries, many of which have won awards, about important or interesting events and people in American history...

Broken Trail is a 2006 Western miniseries that originally aired on American Movie Classics as their first original movie. It stars Robert Duvall and Thomas Haden Church, and was directed by Walter Hill....

We Own the Night is a 2007 American crime drama film written and directed by James Gray and starring Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg, Eva Mendes and Robert Duvall. It is the third film directed by Gray, and the second film to feature Phoenix and Wahlberg together, the first being The Yards...

Crazy Heart is a 2009 American musical-drama film, written and directed by Scott Cooper and based on the 1987 novel of the same name by Thomas Cobb. Jeff Bridges plays a down-and-out country music singer-songwriter who tries to turn his life around after beginning a relationship with a young...

Seven Days in Utopia is the inspirational drama sport film directed by Matt Russell, starring Robert Duvall, Lucas Black, and Melissa Leo.The film is based on the 2009 book Golf's Sacred Journey: Seven Days at the Links of Utopia by Dr. David Lamar Cook, a psychologist who received a Ph.D...

Hemingway & Gellhorn is an upcoming HBO film about the lives of journalist Martha Gellhorn and her husband, writer Ernest Hemingway. It will be directed by Philip Kaufman. The film began shooting in San Francisco in March 2011...